Editorial

In this issue of The Scandinavian Psychoanalytic Jour nal, five original papers are presented, four written by Scandinavian analysts and one by a Scandinavian psychotherapist.

Simo Salonen from Finland opens with a paper compris ing a theoretical introduction to Freud's theory of the death drive and its development in psychoanalysis, followed by a case study illustrating how a patient with a psychotic personality succumbs to her own destructiveness.

Veikko Tahka, also from Finland, follows with a presen tation of a theory of development in which development of the mind is seen as a progressing structuralisation of the representational world of experience, and where the mediation of stage-specific and individual understanding is seen as the central curative factor in psychoanalysis.

Judy Gammelgaard from Denmark investigates the theory of primary process and discusses the metapsy-chological and cognitive views of this phenomenon. The cognitive view is represented by Wilma Bucci and she underlines the consequences of Bucci's concept of “sub-symbolic processes”. In this discussion, she is in line with Simo Keppe in his review of Vesa Talvitie in the Book Section.

Anders Zachrisson from Norway reflects on the specific difficulties presented when having adolescents in psychoanalysis, i.e., keeping a neutral position, keeping to the frames, keeping the adolescent in psychoanalysis, etc. -and he illustrates these difficulties with some vignettes together with the fruitfulness of the use of intuitive interpretations.

Bemt Halvard Sleire from Norway focusses on the combination of pharmacotherapy and psychoanalytic psychotherapy and the manifest, as well as latent meanings of the drug. The problems and challenges of combined treatment are illustrated with a long-standing psychoanalytic therapy.

The section Reports and Brief Communications contains a discussion between Bj0rn Kittingmo from Norway and Marita Torsti-Hagman from Finland. The discussion has as its starting point Killing